A dream, sir, truly!
Directly the bird was fledged, he took to flight, and remembers
neither father nor mother. Yesterday, for instance, was the day we
expected him; he should have come to supper with us. No Robert
to-day, either! He has had some plan to finish, or some bargain to
arrange, and his old parents are put down last in the accounts,
after the customers and the joiner's work. Ah! if I could have
guessed how it would have turned out! Fool! to have sacrificed my
likings and my money, for nearly twenty years, to the education of a
thankless son! Was it for this I took the trouble to cure myself of
drinking, to break with my friends, to become an example to the
neighbourhood? The jovial good fellow has made a goose of himself.
Oh! if I had to begin again! No, no! you see women and children are
our bane. They soften our hearts; they lead us a life of hope and
affection; we pass a quarter of our lives in fostering the growth of
a grain of corn which is to be everything to us in our old age, and
when the harvest-time comes--good-night, the ear is empty!"
Whilt he was speaking, Michael's voice became hoarse, his eye
fierce, and his lips quivered.
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